This Isn't Home
by lovablegeek
Summary: [PreRENT] After April's death, the loft is a different place. MarkBennyMaureen. [One shot]


Benny got out of bed when the glowing green display of the clock across the room read two. He wouldn't be sleeping much that night, if at all. Gently, he lifted Mark's arm off his waist and slid out from beneath the blankets, then turned to watch as Mark rolled over, still asleep, to cling to Maureen. Even sleeping, his brows were knitted together in a faint frown, and after a moment a barely audible whimper escaped him, the same nightmares of the past few nights, presumably. The same nightmares that had haunted him since he'd come home to find April in the bathtub. Benny didn't even want to chance sleep, not and risk the same nightmares, not and wake up with the same wracking sobs. Benny didn't want to risk crying at all.

As he stood there, silently looking down at Mark and Maureen, Maureen shifted a little, smoothing Mark's hair with one hand. He realized abruptly that Maureen hadn't been sleeping either, probably hadn't been since... Well. Mark fell silent and shifted a little closer to Maureen, pressing against her desperately. Benny hesitated for a moment, compelled to say something to Maureen, but he couldn't find the words, and so after a second or two simply turned away and left the room.

He half expected to see Roger there on the couch where he'd been when the three of them went to bed, where he'd been all day, curled into a ball at the far end of the couch, face buried in his arms, completely unresponsive to anything anyone might say to him. But the living room was empty, Roger having apparently retreated to his room and leaving this room silent and empty and dark. The doorway to Roger's room was silent and dark too, the makeshift curtain over the doorway hanging down to close it off as effectively as possible-- Roger's bedroom didn't have a door. The door to the bathroom was closed, as it had been for some time; no one went in there anymore if they could avoid it. Benny let out a soft sigh as he surveyed the room, and quietly walked to the chair beside the couch, sitting down carefully.

It shouldn't be this quiet. Even when everyone in the loft was asleep, you could usually hear someone breathing in another room, occasionally talking in their sleep or rustling the blankets as they shifted. Instead, he couldn't hear anything, any sign of life in here, now that Mark's whimpers had quieted. It was as if April had taken all the lift in this place with her when she died. It was as if this were not a home of living, breathing people into which death had made a sudden intrusion, but a home of death itself, in which the living were mere shadows.

And sitting there, looking around this place, he knew he couldn't stay. In this place, he didn't feel he _could_ be much more than a shadow anymore.

It was some time-- maybe a few minutes, maybe an hour, or two — before the silence was broken, as Benny had known it would be, by Mark's nightmares finally pushing him to break. He heard a brief burst of pained sobs from the bedroom, lapsing into quiet again a minute or two later, punctuated by whispers, Mark's and Maureen's. Benny heard, but didn't listen, didn't need to. This scene had played itself out for the past couple nights, sometimes more than once a night.

"I can't believe her. I can't believe she left."

"I know."

"She's really gone, isn't she?"

"Yes."

As if he needed to be assured of it each time he woke, as if one of those times the answer might change. Eventually the whispers quieted and fell away, giving way to the sound of breathing, and then the same complete silence as before. Benny waited there until he heard light footsteps on the bare floor, moving from the bedroom to the living room. He didn't look over at Maureen as she sat on the couch.

"You couldn't sleep either?" She kept her voice low, quiet — wouldn't want to break the silence too completely, now would we, that demanding, overbearing silence that precluded tears or healing. Benny just shook his head.

"Mark's asleep?" he asked, still not really looking at her, his eyes on the bathroom door. He didn't know why he asked, knowing Maureen couldn't have left Mark alone were he awake, but he had to say _something_, had to keep talking, just enough to keep the silence at bay.

"For now." She shifted a little, and at last Benny looked over to see her legs pulled up to her chest, arms wrapped around her legs and her chin resting on her knee. She wasn't even looking at him now, her face turned away so she couldn't really see it, but she looked so small and fragile that he had to go over to sit beside her on the couch, gingerly put his arm around her shoulders, and she moved a little to lean against him. "Nightmares. Still. He's just..."

"Can you blame him?" When he'd been the first to get home that day, the one to find her, the one who'd had to deal with calling 911 and cleaning up after because Roger had been practically catatonic, and Benny had had to calm a hysterical Maureen. Benny wasn't about to begrudge Mark any amount of nightmares at three in the morning, or numbed silence during the day.

Maureen shook her head mutely, still leaning against Benny's shoulder. "No." She didn't say anything else for some time, and Benny could find nothing more to say to her, no reassurances or comforting words that wouldn't sound weak and paltry and hollow. Sometimes there was nothing _to_ say, and Maureen, it seemed, was just learning that.

"Benny?" she asked softly at last, voice muffled with her face pressed against his shoulder. "This isn't home anymore, is it?"

The question startled him enough that he couldn't answer right away, in part because she had put words to exactly what he had been feeling, his exact thoughts. Finally, he whispered back, "I don't think so."


End file.
